This blog follows geoeconomic and geopolitical developments from the perspective of an Indian investor.

Thursday, March 12, 2009

Dollar Funding of Foreign Banks - some notes

I looked at line item 5) in the TIC data on “Claims on Foreigners by Type and Counterparty”. The item is called “Foreign Banks, including own foreign offices”.The claims peaked at $2.170 Trillion in August 2008. The claims declined to $1.937 trillion by December 2008, the latest data available at the link below. The decrease of $233 billion in claims payable in dollars by foreign banks and foreign branches of US banks is better reflected in the TIC data.Also, the level of around $2 trillion tallies more closely with the BIS estimate of the dollar funding gap faced by foreign banks. The total liability of US banks to foreign banks by end 2008, $ 637.6 b is probably not reflective of the total amount of dollar funding circulating in foreign banking systems.http://www.treas.gov/tic/bctype.txt@Brad: The negative liability line probably represents transfers from branches of foreign banks located in the US to their branches outside the US.Liabilities of US Chartered banks to foreign banks grew from $293.8 b at the end of 2004 to $637.6 b at the end of 2008. This growth creates a picture of increasing borrowings of US banks from foreign banks. Also, the growth in US banks liabilities to foreign banks doesn’t explain the increase in liabilities of foreign bank branches to foreign banks. US Banks liabilities to foreign banks grew from $ 420.3 b at the end of 2006 to $478.2b at the end of 2007, an increase of only $ 57.9 b. The liabilities of foreign branches to foreign banks grew from -$255.3b to -$424.50b between 2006 and 2007, an increase of $ 169.20 billion in owings from foreign banks to their branches here.I remember seeing a line item in the TIC data reflecting something like claims on foreign banks payable in dollars.I think that might be a better indication of the amount of dollar loans not rolled over/withdrawn from foreign banks.

Brad: the combined assets of the broker-dealers and funding companies rose by around $325b (if I got the math and netting right)

Me: From L129 and L130 I got an increase of $326.60 b. I took the funding cos investments in broker dealers out of the total assets for 2008 and 2007. The difference could be rounding.